


I won't be okay and won't pretend I am

by Velocity_Owl87



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always the Opposite Sex, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Always a girl! Thor, Domestic Violence, Drama, Families of Choice, Female Friendship, Fluff and Angst, Male-Female Friendship, Multi, Recovery, Romantic Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-10
Updated: 2012-05-10
Packaged: 2017-11-05 02:55:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/401688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velocity_Owl87/pseuds/Velocity_Owl87
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki is smitten the first time he meets Thora Odinsdottir, but has enough experience to see that there's something cracked and fragile about her. This makes him hold back from showing his affections until Thora's life explodes, making it necessary for their circle of friends to step in and for Loki to finally admit and act on how deep his feelings for Thora really go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I won't be okay and won't pretend I am

**Author's Note:**

> Thor is always the strong one and I admit that I wanted to write this story to turn the trope of strong Thor being the saviour to Loki in either male or female form around and show that even supposedly strong people need help sometimes.
> 
> I have tried to be as realistic and as sensitive to the issue of domestic abuse as I possibly could within a fiction setting. It's not biographical, but it is based on different scenarios that I've come across throughout the years regarding this situation mixed up and fictionalized. Also, Always a girl! Thor was the obvious choice to show that situations like these can happen to anyone, whether they are perceived as strong enough to avoid them or not.

_"I want you to stay here beside me  
I won't be okay and I won't pretend I am  
So just tell me today and take my hand"-Snow Patrol _

 

The first time he sees Thora Odinsdottir, he has to admit that he is stunned. 

She's quite striking, with that mass of reddish brown hair, wide set grey eyes and curvy body packaged in a frame that would make even Sif envious. 

She doesn't wrap herself up like Sif though. Nothing revealing and nothing fancy either. Just t-shirts that hug her curves, jeans, sneakers, arm warmers and hoodies. 

It still doesn't detract from the fact that she's gorgeous and he wants her. 

He's not reacted that way to a girl before, that raw visceral want that pools in his guts almost as brutally as a sucker punch.

He doesn't know if she sees it on his face, but her expression is shuttered when he shakes her hand once Jane has finished the introductions. She doesn't let her hand linger and Loki feels like a creep for making such a bad impression on her.

That is until he sees the same expression on her face as she meets Fandral,Tony,Volstagg,and Steve.

It is the reaction she has with Steve that make alarm bells ring in the back of his mind. Something's not quite right, but he's not sure what it is exactly.

If it had been Fandral or even Tony, he wouldn't have paid attention, but when a girl is acting antsy around Steve, the epitome of goodness and Boy Scout morals...something is definitely not right there.

Steve picks up on it and gives Thora her space, but even then, she doesn't fully relax until she has at least two feet of distance between herself and him. Loki wonders how she learned to keep out of striking range and the thought makes him slightly sad for her. 

The sadness gets deeper when he sees her face clears when Darcy and Jane come to hustle her away to show her some sights, leaving Sif with them, since they all now have class and Jane and Darcy don't. 

That is the other clue that set his alarms ringing again, but he has no time to analyze it. He needs all his brains for his Earth Sciences class. He'll ponder the mystery of Thora Odinsdottir when he has more time.

"What do you think of Thora?" Sif asks him as they walk to class.

"She's something else." Loki says, trying for once to be tactful. 

He's sure that if he spoke the truth, that he found Thora "Beautiful and broken and fucked up and so desirable." Sif would have his head.

"Yeah. She is. God is she ever." Sif comments and Loki has to suppress a groan at Sif's words.

Normally, he wouldn't give a shit what girls Sif was pursuing, but it was different with Thora. Even that small chance meeting tells him that she is no conquest material.

"I didn't think girls like that are your type." Loki comments, because he has to say something and Sif expects it.

"Usually, no. But that girl's stacked and cute and sweet. I can go for that."

Loki gives a short humorless laugh, but doesn't say anything else. They've reached their class and have to scramble to find seats and get ready for their professor to start the lecture. 

He makes a mental note to talk Sif out of the idea of pursuing Thora. Not because he's also toying with that idea, but rather because of what he saw in her face in those brief moments that they interacted and he knew that being a notch on someone's belt was probably the last thing that girl needed.

He just hoped that Sif wouldn't take offense and pursue Thora out of spite and crack her just a bit more.

Two

To his surprise, Thora ends up appearing in one of his electives for Earth Sciences. He doesn't think that they're going to even talk, but she ends up sitting beside him the second class she comes to. 

Loki expects to simply exchange greetings and work without really talking, but to his surprise, he ends up actually initiating conversations with her that aren't about the course or their majors. He expects Thora to give him monosyllabic answers as she has done to Sif's thinly veiled attempts at seduction. But to his shock, she responds and he finds himself asking her if she wants to join him for coffee.

She doesn't say yes until the fourth time and Loki gets the sense that he's passed a test that he wasn't even aware he had been taking part of.

He's okay with it, because Thora, despite her cute and quiet tomboyish appearance has a wicked sense of humour and a loud laugh that is irresistable and makes him join in when he hears it. He doesn't regret waiting for her to come out of her shell. Nor does he regret taking it slow with her. Thora is still as captivating as she was the fist time that he saw her and even if they just end up friends, he doesn't mind.

What he does mind is the secrecy. She won't talk about her family or if she's single or dating and he seldom gets a clear picture of what her life was before she came to University. 

He knows, that there is a reason for her reticence. His family wasn't exactly the all Canadian type. He didn't live in a good neighborhood. He understands that there's something similar in Thora's past.

They both leave gaps in their autobiographies and he supposes that's the reason why she feels comfortable with him in a way that she doesn't with the others. 

It's not until finals that she finally tells him what her secret is.

"You need to go to the police." Is the first thing he blurts out after she finishes.

She shakes her head and pulls the arm warmers she always wears up and her sleeves down. He knows that there are more bruises and cuts and scars under the rest of the layers she chooses to wear. 

He realizes the reason behind the layers, but now he understands that they are her armour against the world. She is safe as long as she is covered and the realization makes his heart crack just a bit. 

"There's no point in going." She finally tells him once she's gotten herself covered up again. She pushes her hair out of her face and smiles faintly.

Loki frowns. 

"There's proof. You should file a report at the very least."

She shakes her head and Loki feels an impotent stab of rage at her stubbornness and wishes he could simply go ahead and press charges against that son of a bitch that's mistreating her so seriously. But he knows that if he does, she might just turn against him to protect that rat bastard that holds her hostage more or less.

"Thank you though. You are a good friend, Loki."

Loki thinks he pulls of the smile, because Thora gets closer and gives him a tentative hug. He knows it isn't her that's needing the comfort. She's offering him the comfort and

He holds her gingerly, mindful of her bruises and her mental state and wishes that he could hold her tighter and never let her go. 

 

Three

Loki's deeply asleep on Steve's couch after they pulled a twelve hour shift at Bucky's bakery when his phone starts ringing insistently. He moves to pick it up and turn it off, but when he sees Darcy's number on the display, he doesn't even hesitate to answer it. Darcy's not one to call just to chat. She's got texting for that. Calling always means something serious is going down.

"What happened?" He asks, his voice rough from sleep as he sits up and rubs the sleep out of his eyes. Or tries to. He's only slept about four hours and he desperately needs the sleep before he goes berserk from sleep deprivation.

But he always promised himself that he was never going to leave Darcy hanging. Especially not when she's always been there for him.

"Thora's in the hospital. That son of a bitch did a number on her. She's pressed charges and now she needs help."

Loki closed his eyes and swore quietly. 

"I'm guessing the shelter's not an option?"

Darcy laughed bitterly. "With all the cuts, there's no room. Busy season, I guess. And he knows where Jane and I live."

Loki swore loudly this time and ran his hand through his hair, making it stand on end.

"Look, I can't promise anything, but I think Steve will be fine if she crashes here. I just don't see how she would agree to it, since I get the feeling her track record with decent men hasn't been the best." 

Darcy made a small noise of agreement at that. It was painfully obvious to anyone that had spent time with Thora that was the case more often than not. 

"She agreed when Jane made the suggestion. She trusts you and Steve, by extension."

Loki rubbed at his eyes and felt like they would start bleeding at any moment, with how dry they were. He really only wanted to crawl in a hole somewhere and fall asleep and not wake up for years. But Thora was the one calling and needing his help and he simply couldn't walk away.

"All right. So how are we going to do this?"

Four

When Loki sees Thora at the hospital, he nearly turns around to go hunting that bastard down. It was only Steve's grip on his bicep that kept him from running away and doing exactly that. 

She looks, for the first time since he met her, utterly broken.

The left side of her face is covered in white bandages, her eye hidden under the mass of gauze and tape. What isn't covered up, is a ripe red-purple and swollen badly enough to make him wince. Her right arm is in a sling and is encased in a cast from fingertips to her shoulder. She's wearing a pink tank top that he's sure he's seen on Darcy before and it does nothing to cover the bruises that go from her neck down her shoulder and back. 

The worst is that half of her hair is hacked off just at the nape of her neck and she's silently crying, too exhausted and battered to even put up that much of a front. Darcy has her arm around her, providing some sort of buffer, but it's not enough. Even the officers that are talking to Jane can't hide their discomfort at the sight.

Steve moves close enough to offer more of a shield and Loki slowly comes up to Darcy and Thora, careful to give them enough room to know that he's safe. Darcy shoots him a grateful look and Thora manages to calm herself enough to give him a lopsided smile that just cuts to the depths of him.

"Ready to go? Steve's borrowed the car from Bucky." He tells her, keeping his voice matter of fact. She doesn't need someone else freaking out about the injuries and the situation. That he's learned from dealing with his mother back in the day.

She nods and she manages to get a quiet murmur of thanks out. Steve takes that as his cue and goes to get the car closer to the entrance. Even with help, he doubts that she's going to be able to walk that far.

"You and Jane coming along?" 

Darcy nods jerkily. Her eyes are red rimmed and her lip looks swollen and he's willing to bet that she's been chewing it hard throughout the whole damned time she's been with Thora. 

He doesn't have to waste any more time on small talk, because Steve pulls the car up and he gets Thora and Darcy into the backseat without too much fuss. They only have to wait for Jane to finish talking to the police and they are on their way to Steve and Loki's place. 

They get Thora settled in Loki's bed and give the dose of painkillers that she was prescribed by the doctor before leaving her there with Darcy, who has appointed herself Thora's guardian and simply won't leave her alone until she is sure that Thora is completely safe.

That leaves Loki, Steve and Jane sitting around the kitchen table, mainlining the black death that Steve calls coffee and trying to figure out the rest of the logistics of what to do with Thora.

He hates deciding someone's life like that. Discussing how to get her belongings and what to do with her living situation. Thora's an adult. She should be able to do choose what she will do, not just have someone choose it for her. But as Jane points out, she's in shock, scared and in pain. And at least she did make the decision to have Jane, Darcy and Loki himself come to her aid. 

It mollifies him, but it still doesn't make it okay in his books. 

But he's cynical and pragmatic enough to realize that in this situation, nothing will be okay. At least not until Thora's healed and put this fucking nightmare behind her. 

He has to remind himself of that when he checks in on her and Darcy.

It's the only way that will make him stay put and not go after the bastard that did all of that to her.

Five

He was busy reviewing some of his notes when he heard her finally speak to him without stammering or whispering.

"Hey, um, Loki?" 

He startles slightly at the sound of Thora's voice before turning around to look at her. 

She's standing hesitantly at the kitchen doorway and even though a week has passed, she still is weak and looks like she's gone through a shredder. The sight of her looking like that still makes him angry, but the desire to go after her ex has dissipated.

That's simply because Tony, Clint and Steve took care of it before he had a chance to even plan anything. They're tight-lipped about the situation, but he knows that something went down and that Thora has lost most of the haunted look after Steve took her aside and said something to her that neither of them will divulge to him. 

Loki doesn't care. Or he tells himself he doesn't to ease the sting of being left out of helping Thora feel safe. Even though Thora's slowly getting better because of his help, it still doesn't feel like he's done enough.

"Yeah?" 

She purses her lips and winces as the movement pulls at the stitches at the corner of her mouth.

"Can you cut my hair?"

Loki nodded without hesitation, despite wondering why she'd come to him with such a request. He would have thought that Darcy or Jane would have been the first choice, but he guessed that they weren't available or maybe, just maybe, Thora was feeling well enough to need space from them without feeling guilty about pushing them away.

Besides, her hair badly needed trimming, since the preliminary job had been only a stop gap measure and left her looking like the refugee that she truly was. The short, ragged hair made her look like a vulnerable waif and it made him feel that she needed to be treated even more like spun glass, something that he was sure she didn't get much of in her formative years.

He's determined to change that. To make her realize that she's worth so much more than being used and being someone's punching bag. She's beautiful and so fucking special to the point that it hurts deep in his chest when he realizes that she's changed him. 

Thora's gotten under his skin more than anyone else has in his circle of friends. He had spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out why she was the case when it hadn't been Darcy or Steve and he understood that it was probably because for once, he wasn't the one being shown that the world wasn't a nasty and fucked up place.

That he was the one showing it to someone else instead.

"Yeah. Sure."

Six

"So when are you going to man up and talk to her?" Darcy asks him as they are on the train home after class. 

"I don't know. Isn't it too soon? I don't want to take advantage of her or be a fucking creep."

"Loki...do you actually think that any of us would let you near her if you were still your charming asshole self? Seriously. Give yourself some credit."

"Wow. Thanks for the backhanded compliment, Darcy. You sure know how to bring up a guy."

"Anytime, Loki. But seriously. You guys need to talk more than just the way you've been doing. She's over that asshole and I know that she trusts you as much as she likes you."

"That's...good. I mean, I want more. You know that. I'm sure that I'm being pretty obvious in this. But how do I bring it up to her without seeming like a opportunistic creep is the question."

"You're not. If you had leaped on her a day after we brought her to your apartment, then trust me. You wouldn't even be here to contemplate this. It's been eight months. She's got her life back together in all areas and you guys are good for each other. You know where she's coming from and vice versa. I don't think she'd be that good with Sif."

"Please tell me that you're kidding with that last bit."

"Wish I was. They went out for coffee the other day. Just coffee, but if Sif has her way, it would be more and I don't think Sif's the right person to be with her. And not just because I personally think she's an insufferable bitch."

"I don't either. I'm just scared that I won't be that person for her too."

"Are you fucking kidding me? Again, you could have totally seduced her when you cut her hair that time, but you acted like a perfect gentleman. I wasn't there, but I heard the finer points of it and if I wasn't such a good girlfriend to Steve, I'd be tempted."

"Wait... She told you about that? What else did she say?"

"Oh Jesus, Loki! Get your shit together and actually TALK to the girl. She's into you. You're into her. Now actually use the pair you have and talk to her before she ends up being Sif's latest conquest."

"You made your point. I'll talk to her tonight."

Seven

He's just finishing editing an essay when she comes home from her shift at the bakery where Steve got her a job after she was able to work again and she looks exhausted.

"Hey." She greets him as she pulls her hair out of the ponytail she can scrape it in now and leaves it flowing loose around her shoulders. It's not quite near it's former glory, but it's getting there and Loki gets the same itch to run his hands through it again and see if it's as soft as it was when he cut it for her.

Darcy is right, he realizes. He really needs to talk to Thora and see if they are both on the same page. 

"Hey. Long shift?" He asks, pushing his essay away and concentrating on Thora, who sinks down across from him and sighs.

"Yeah. It was quiet and then we got hit with a rush. I swear they have a radar or something." Thora replied as she moved to the counter and poured herself a cup of the tea that Loki had made in anticipation for her arrival. 

It has become their ritual ever since Thora had also begun to work at the bakery. Whoever was off was in charge of making the tea and then they would unwind before heading off to their rooms. If Steve was around, he'd join in, but for the most part, it was their time together. 

"Hey, Thora. I think we need to talk about what's going on here."

Loki blurted out and turned her. For someone that used his mouth as his primary weapon, he had to admit that was a pretty clumsy opening. 

Thora's face gets expressionless at this and she's about to respond when her phone beeps, making her roll her eyes as she gets it out and looks at the screen. She frowns and shoves the phone in her pocket before turning her attention to Loki, who is trying to pretend he's not curious about the text and freaking out about how the conversation is going to go.

"Yeah. I think we do. Especially since Sif is starting to step up her game. I'm starting to really regret going for coffee with her that time."

Thora snorts before she continues.

"Besides, it's not like she's not made it obvious she wants in my pants. Funny how now that I'm not fucked up, she's all over me like a cheap shirt."

She looks at him and leans on the table to look at him much more closely and he feels his mouth go dry at the speculative look she's giving him with those dark grey eyes of hers. She's not looked at him directly in the eye in what feels like years and he admits that he's not sure how he's supposed to respond to her now. 

But he does know that she's giving him an opening and he'd better take it before it gets horribly awkward and stupid between them. Besides, he knows that they have dragged this on too long.

"Yeah. Well, I don't think she's good for you anyways. Maybe for a fling. But not if you're looking for something else with meaning."

Thora's eyes widen at his response and get even wider when he leans on the table to get closer to her.

"So is this you saying that you could do better? That even though you've seen how fucked up I was and how it could be hard and weird and awkward, you'd still be there and make it all work?"

She asks, her voice rushed and pitched a bit high in her nervousness.

"Would you want me to try to do that and not just as a friend, but as something more?"

Loki blurts out, finesse sacrificed for a desire to know as rapidly as possible. They had waited long enough. They really couldn't afford to waste more time dodging an issue that was all too clear to not address.

Thora's face goes white, then crimson. She takes a while to reply and Loki's about to back away and pretend the conversation didn't happen when Thora reaches out and holds him in place.

"Yes."

End.


End file.
